Mighty Max: The Reboot We Truly Need
Itwas all going to hell for me inside a haunted house. I was five or six and had begged my dad for a solid year to take me to the abandoned schoolhouse that turned into a Halloween fun-fest every October.
Inside that musty, fog machine-filled pit of horror, I clung to my dad’s leg, wishing that I had never suggested to come here in the first place. “Why did I even want to do this?” I thought. “I’m not brave. I’m a little kid and these are legit monsters who want nothing more than to murder the crap out of me.”
Then, as the fear took over, making my legs stiff with terror, I reached up and touched my head. I felt the red snapback, wet with sweat. I felt the large yellow M on the front of it. I felt Mighty Max’s cap.
A jolt of bravery surged through me as I recalled his adventures. How he fought the vicious Skullmaster and all of his minions without fear. I, too, shouldn’t be afraid.
In that moment, that silly hat gave me the courage to keep moving. I didn’t move well, but I did move. After all, I had the hat.
Thinking back through rose-colored glasses about this stage of my life, Mighty Max was really the first time I experienced a fantasy story. The first time I lost myself in something imaginative. But where are these stories today? Why are children’s TV shows so much weirder and funnier — having gags every 10 seconds to keep kids entertained — but much less focus on actual narrative? Why are there no more serialized children’s stories, especially now that kids can watch them at any hour of day?
To answer this, let’s explore the rise and fall of Mighty Max, one of the last true fantasy-filled children’s programs, and one that — obviously — holds a place in my heart. I’m not saying that I have all of the toys, but I’m not denying it, either.
Mighty Max, the Boy, the Myth, the Prophesied
First, a brief synopsis:
For those who don’t know, "); background-size: 1px 1px; background-position: 0px calc(1em + 1px);">Mighty Max was a preteen boy with an attitude problem who lived a normal 90s life in the suburbs. You know, skateboards, backwards hats, etc. One day after school, Max comes home to find a weird package waiting for him. Inside, he finds a fowl-shaped relic that says, in some form of hieroglyphic text, that he is the chosen one — the “cap-bearer” — and he must quickly go to the mini-mart down the street.
Max ends up dropping the statue, shattering it, which reveals a red cap with a large yellow M on the front of it. The same hat I wore in that haunted house. He puts it on and heads to the mini-mart where he ends up fighting a lava monster. Yes, a lava monster right in the local 7–11.
A battle ensues and Max ends up getting teleported to a far off desert where he meets Virgil, a wise fowl whose race — the Lemurians — were defeated thousands of years ago by Skullmaster, the show’s villain. Alongside Virgil, he also meets Norman, a Viking warrior who serves as Max’s protector.
Virgil explains that Max’s rise to become the cap-bearer was prophesied nearly 5,000 years ago by the Lemurians. It is now his sacred duty to protect the world from the vicious Skullmaster alongside Norman and Virgil, who will aid him as much as they can.
The subsequent episodes — there were 41 of them in total — followed Mighty Max’s quest to defeat Skullmaster. Along the way, countless foes are slaughtered, histories revealed, and — at the end of each episode — Max came on the screen to share what locations the crew went to, adding a bit of an educational angle to a show that was primarily about defeating monsters.
